


The Map of One Man's Heart.

by datsunblue



Category: Ripper Street
Genre: Bisexuality, Canon Compliant, Death, F/M, Friendship, Heartbreak, Love, M/M, Possible dubious consent?, Season 1, sort of, well it weaves through the canon ok?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-24
Updated: 2014-11-24
Packaged: 2018-02-26 20:59:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,799
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2666177
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/datsunblue/pseuds/datsunblue
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bennet Drake's story. A bit more in depth.<br/>And things you didn't admit to in 1889.</p><p>Set amid “The Weight of One Man's Heart”, “Tournament of Shadows” and “A Man of My Company”. Spoilers up to Season 2 episode 1. Follows canon as much as possible, except for, you know, the not so heterosexual bits.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Map of One Man's Heart.

* * * * *

 

The first time since childhood, that he wakes with the heat of another body beside him, he opens his eyes to the stabbing pain of a hangover, and the sight of Captain Jackson's bare chest under his own chin.

His jaw aches, and he dimly recalls a punch thrown. Jackson's face slipping in and out of focus, the smell of stale beer, whiskey, sweat..... and something else.

He tries to sit up. The room spins, and he realizes he is naked. Naked in a whorehouse, and yet in bed with another man, also naked and uncovered. It would be laughable, he thinks, if it weren't so horrifying.

Jackson is stirring, so he fumbles quickly around on the floor for his drawers, desperate to get covered up. He closes his eyes for a moment in dismay when he discovers the dried semen across his stomach. His hands shake a little, and he tells himself it's just the hangover.

Jackson coughs and sits up to hock into the spittoon by the bedside, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

“Well Sergeant, this is a turn of events.”

It's would be difficult to miss the fact that Jackson is half hard, his lean muscled body twisted at the waist to lean on one elbow, ankles crossed one across the other, looking rather debauched, if bleary.

He says nothing, just grits his teeth together and resolves to get out of there. Piece by piece he tracks down the rest of his clothes and reassembles himself. Piece by piece, last night is coming back to him, in moans and grunts, sweat and bay rum, harsh whiskey, tongue and teeth, rage and relief. Jackson's smirking face looming above it all, the brush of moustache against his jaw and lips against his throat, and it is this that sends a jolt through him, bypassing the guilt centre of his brain and travelling directly to his cock. He swallows back the bile as his gut churns over either the whiskey or the memory, he's not sure which.

“I'm like to shoot the mule as kicked me last night.” Jackson groaned, face in hands, as he sits up on the side of the bed. He rubs at his face and jaw, wincing.

He's about to open his mouth to say; _You'd have to catch me first_ , when he realizes just how wrong that would sound, just how wrong it is of him to even think it. He frowns.

“Ah Drake. Don't over-think it. You're making more of it than it is. We ain't hurt no one. 'Cept each other a little, maybe.” Jackson's mouth is twisted into a wry grin at one corner, as he gently probes the graze and swelling across his cheek. That's when Drake notices the red marks at the sides of the man's neck, recalls grabbing the front of his shirt and twisting, their faces close together, breath hot on one another's faces, then the sudden clash of teeth and lips, the spiralling loss of control that led them here. He can't breath, needs air, needs to get out of this room.

“Wait.” Jackson grabs him by the wrist as he turns for the door. “Take the back stairs if you want. Left. Down the hall.” The thumb that rubs across his pulse point, two, three times, is rough but warm, and he finds himself forcing air into his lungs in a rush that makes him slightly dizzy. Jackson pats him firmly on the upper arm, comrade-like. “I'll see you at the yard later.”

He nods. Firm. Reassuring. _Let's forget this_ , he thinks. _It'll do no good to dwell. This business with Rose has left me a bit off kilter is all._

 

_* * * * *_

Of course, it happened again. It was as if he had bought it about simply by lingering over the murky memories. He finds that after the mess with Faulkner, and Jackson saving his life, he feels somewhat adrift, in need of anchoring. So he turns to the fights, as he does. So often, the pain is the only thing that makes him feel alive.

Jackson is there, after. Mops up his bloody face, and drags him to a bar, where they drink awful, cheap booze, and circle one another sniping and slicing with sharp words. Until finally, a hand on the arm is too much for him, and he storms out to the alley to piss up against the wall. He feels the cut on his brow has opened up, the blood drips down his nose and splashes on the cobbles. He spits. Blood and piss and spit. Sometimes it feels like that's all he is.

“Come on. I've a bottle of whiskey at mine.” Jackson steps up beside him to relieve himself. He need not look to his left. Just knowing that Jackson is standing there next to him with his cock in his hand makes a shiver run down his backbone. The euphoria of the fight has eased over into this strange feeling of inevitability. Dread and excitement.

He just nods and follows Jackson back to the whorehouse.

 

* * * * *

It seems like a simple thing, to rut up against the man. No gentle thing. He can't imagine it's anything like this with a woman. But he wouldn't know. He was saving himself. For the right woman. That could have been Rose. He almost lets out a laugh when he thinks of the irony of that. Jackson has had Rose, now Jackson has had him. Who knows how many men Rose has had, and here is him, all naivety. Well, look at him now, in the bed of the debauched American no less, hand on another man's cock. How strange.

Jackson is spitting on his fingers and reaching down behind Drake's balls.

“What are you doing?” He tries to pull away, but Jackson pulls him back.

“Trust me. I'm a Doctor.”

Jackson is watching him closely, and he feels his eyes go wide.

He's not entirely sure he _does_ trust the man.

 

* * * * *

In the end, he goes to Rose, heart in hand. Asks her to take him as he is. Because, if he never asks, he'll never know for sure. When she breaks his heart, the pain is so visceral, so tearing. His longing for her, like a deep wound. And yet, he feels it. He is alive in his pain.

He bares her no ill will, for who could hate Rose?

 

* * * * *

During the strike, Jackson saves his life again. Like it's becoming a habit. He looks for the man, with the excuse of returning his gun to him, but he is nowhere to be found that evening. The next day at the yard, they meet in Reid's office. After being given their orders, Drake turns back to address Jackson.

“Oh, ah. Jackson, ah... I , ah...” He hands over the gun, and a look passes between them. He quickly turns away to grab his coat.

“Your welcome.” says Jackson to his back. They exchange another look before heading out the door.

 

Later he walks in to the orphanage to find Reid kissing Miss Goren. It rattles him so much, he can not finish his sentence.

 

After the bombs are diffused and Zotkin captured, Jackson drags him into a dark corner amid the crates of Paris Green. With his left hand in bandages, he fumbles at Drake's trousers. Drake pushes his hand away and drops to his knees instead. Jackson is hot and heavy in his mouth. The man has to shove his wrist into his mouth to muffle his cry when he comes, and Drake feels stupidly grateful to have this man as his friend. Clever and depraved as he is.

 

* * * * *

Constable Hobbs, it turns out, does not have shit for brains. This is a surprise, given his apparent age and general manner. The lad has shown initiative on more than one occasion, and Drake thinks with a little steering in the right direction, he could make a fine copper after all. So at the end of shift one evening, he invites the boy to join him down the pub with Reid and a few of the others. The boy seems chuffed to bits to be sitting at the bar with them, but Reid is called back to the station only half a pint in. Drake takes the Inspector's abandoned drink and tips it into Hobbs glass with a grin.

“Waste not, want not.”

“That's what me Mam says.” Replies Hobbs with a grin.

He can tell the lad isn't much of a drinker by the way he holds his pint.

“How old are you Hobbs?”

“Twenty in November.” This makes Drake raise an eyebrow. He wouldn't have put him past seventeen. And to think, he himself had been off fighting for King and country at that age.

“I know. I don't look it. Mam said I'd fill out, but I never did yet. Adalee says she don't mind 'cause I don't take up hardly any of the bed!” He let out a snort.

“Adalee?”

“My wife.”

“You're married?” Drake wonders at how this slip of a lad could get himself a wife, and yet he himself was trudging through this life alone.

“Yeah.” Something around the edges of Hobbs eyes makes Drake wonder about the happiness of the marriage.

“Kids?”

“Not yet. Only been married six months.” Hobbs is looking down, into his glass, avoiding the other man's eyes. “What about yourself Inspector?”

“Bachelor as yet.” He thinks of Rose, and what might have been. Sighs. Thinks of Jackson, frowns, and pushes his finger hard against the rim of the pint, drawing out a squeak of protest from it's surface. Clears his throat.

“Inspector Reid has mentioned the fact that you might benefit from some instruction in hand to hand combat techniques.” He tries to say it lightly, not wanting the boy to take it the wrong way.

Hobbs blushes. “From you Sir?” Drake nods. “I'd like that very much Sir.”

 

* * * * *

 

Tuesday afternoon rolls around to find the two of them stripped to the waist, in the dirt yard behind the station. Drake finds he has an aversion to throwing punches at the boy's face, has to force himself to swing for the sake of instruction. Hobbs is slight enough that Drake's own style of fighting will not suit, so instead he teaches the boy a few moves to unbalance his opponent. How to find the weak spots. To use his tall body and long arms to his advantage. A couple of dirty tricks.

They grapple, and when he takes Hobbs down, he tries to ensure the boy's head comes to no harm at least, by cradling his hand in his hair at point of impact, earning himself a stinging graze to the back of his hand. He finds himself admiring the lines of the boy, the way sinews move and stretch as they circle one another, feels a stirring low in his belly, and shakes his head. _Is this how it's going to be now? Has Jackson opened a door in me that can never be closed?_

It's in this moment of distraction that Hobbs gets in under his defences and knocks a foot out from under him. He automatically grabs at the boy, taking him down with him, but his own head still collects a rattling blow against the hard packed dirt, stunning him for a moment.

“Sir? Are you alright Sir?” Hobbs face inches from his own, full of concern. His own fingers still clutched tight around the boy's arm. Hobbs is sprawled across him, a bony hip digging into his lower stomach, and something else. Drakes lips fall open in surprise. The boy is hard.

“Sorry, Sir.” Hobbs backs away from him blushing.

“It's alright.” Drake's slightly scrambled wits attempt to right themselves. “Fighting gets the blood up, eh?” He tries for a grin. “Help me up boy.” He takes the hand offered and hauls up onto his feet. The two stand there staring at each other. Hobbs looking flustered, Drake trying to look casual, until he realizes they are still holding hands like a courting couple. He laughs and releases the boy, walks over to the water pump and splashes himself with bracingly cold water. When he turns around, Hobbs is still staring at him.

“I think that's enough to be going on with. I'm sure you'll be wanting to get home to the Missus.”

“Right.” Hobbs takes a deep breath, frowns, and turns to go, then stops, turns back towards him. “Will we do this again Sir? I mean, it's been very helpful. I think.”

“Yeah, alright. Maybe next week then?”

 

* * * * *

It is only the next day when Drake takes the boy with him on an arrest. Which doesn't turn out to be an arrest after all, since the man has obviously quit his lodgings. When he concludes his search of the room, he finds Hobbs is leaning against the closed door, hand still on the doorknob, a pleading expression on his face.

“Please Sir, I need to know. Is there something......? Do you.....?” The boy stops, Licks his lips.

And Drake thinks he knows that look now. So he steps forward, right up to Hobbs, who is a little taller than him. He stands close enough to feel breath on his face, but not quite touching.

“Yes?” He's careful in the way he says it. This could go either way.

Hobbs' hand raises cautiously to Drakes cheek, cradles his jaw gently, and Drake finds his eyes close of their own accord as he leans ever so slightly into the touch. Warm lips meet his own, and his mouth opens automatically to admit tongue. It sensuous, slow. Entirely unlike kissing Jackson, which is all rush and desperation. Hobbs long fingers on the back of his neck make him want to melt. He presses against the boy, but the rough scratch of the woollen uniform under his fingers pulls him up short. He leans back to look at the boy's face.

“Your wife?” He has to ask, it's one of many issues here, but to him, it seems the most pressing.

“I....” Hobbs looks so vulnerable, and he stammers. “Mother made me marry. She... found me... with someone.... and....” He shrugs.

“I see.” And he does. He looks the boy over. So meticulously presented. Uniform just so. Nails scrubbed. Cheeks rosy. Expression of adoration and wonder. He speculates as to if this is some misguided case of hero-worship, thinks of his own reputation for violence, and wonders how this could possibly be attractive. In the end, it's the uniform that stops him, of all things. He can not get past it.

He steps back, straightens the boys jacket, puts his hat to rights.

“Not here. Will you....” He hesitates. Is he sure about this? “Will you meet me later? At The Brown Bear?”

“Of course Sir!” Hobbs enthusiastic grin is a sight to behold.

 

 

They don't manage to meet that night. They both end up working late, Hobbs chasing paperwork for Reid, while Drake chases down a suspect in a murder case.

 

When Rose turns up at his door, he can not turn her away. He actually finds it comforting to have another person in his rooms, even in her distressed state. He cares for her still, though in a different manner, as if the starlight has been stripped from his eyes. He now sees there is something missing between them. Something not vital for a marriage, but perhaps vital for a happy marriage.

 

 

* * * * *

Hobbs never gets his second lesson.  
  
When Drake rushes in to the Dead Room, hoping there has been a mistake, his heart sinks into his shoes at the sight of the lad laid out on the table. All blue lips and grey skin.

“Not the boy.” He swallows back a cry that threatens to drown him if let loose.“How Mr Reid?”

Reid is at a loss. “I, ah.”

He too, is struggling to function under the weight of this knowledge.

Drake stands, mystified, as Reid pries open the boys hand. His eyes roam the length of the body, eyes lingering on the long-fingered hands that had mapped the back of his own skull and neck so recently.

“Help me Bennet.” Says Reid.

He realises that Reid expects him to help undress the boy for examination. He never got to do this while the boy was alive, and now he must do it in death. It seems so grossly unfair.

The manner of death is so awful. A knife in the spine. To drown like that, unable to fight back. But so clever of the boy, to grasp that tiny ship, to bring them a clue, even in death.

“Mr Reid, when we find the persons who done this, we may kill them, may we not Sir?” When Artherton speaks these words, a change rolls over Drake. _Yes_. He thinks. _Yes_.

 

* * * * *

When he walks in to Reid's office, and finds Jackson pointing a gun at his head, he truly begins to wonder if the man has has lost his mind.

When Reid hands the ring over to Jackson and says “You are he then. The Matthew Judge engraved on the inner.” Drake feels such a sense of betrayal. He wonders what else he has missed. He tears off after Jackson, or Judge, or whatever his name is, _that man_ , to demand what the hell is he playing at, when Reid pulls him up short. The hunt is on for Hobbs' killer. That's what is important now.

A cold rage fuels him all the way through to the arrest of Frank Goodnight, and when Jackson turns up, when he utters the words, “You shouldn't have killed the boy Frank.” and shoots the murdering bastard between the eyes, what Drake feels mostly, is numb.

 

* * * * *

He sits in the pub with others and drinks his way steadily through Hobbs' wake. The tears roll down his cheeks. He can not stop them. Doesn't want to. He finds himself unable to speak, and so sits apart from the others. He stands and sways when Artherton lifts his voice in lament.

Jackson is locked in a cell at the yard. Drake doesn't want to believe he could be the Ripper. But the man has so many secrets, and he finds himself laying the blame for Hobbs death at Jackson's door. After all, Frank Goodnight had come looking for Jackson (or Matthew Judge rather). If not for Jackson, Hobbs would still be walking this earth, in Drake's mind.

He takes himself to the whorehouse, hoping to find some comfort, even if in the arms of a stranger. When he meets Bella, he realizes it is not the act he needs, but simply the comfort of another living being. She is kind. She puts her arm around him, and it is enough. He sleeps for a little while in her arms. The first sleep that is not drink induced, since he saw Hobbs laid out on the slab.

 

* * * * *

When Rose goes missing, he throws himself back into the work. It is a relief to have his mind wholly occupied again.

Bella's submission for the lonely hearts column catches his eye. He knows it is tailored to catch the attention of Rose's captor, but it pulls at him all the same.

When Reid chooses Bella to play the role of bait, Drake feels some panic rise within him. But he squashes it down. When he hears her cry out his name as that villainous toff whisks her away, he feels all his fears justified, and those fears fuel his legs as he runs. The gun shot that rings out across the park almost stops his heart. But it turns out that she is a woman with both guts and brains, for she has shot the awful man in the neck rather than let him make off with her, and her perfect recall of their conversation reveals an important clue.

Before Drake leaves her to the care of one of the other inspectors, she takes his hand.

“Please, will you come see me Mr Drake? When you are done here?” She is rattled by her experience, but not witless as some young women would be.

“Of course Miss.” He gives her a gentle smile. “I thank you. Your help here has been invaluable.” He would kiss her hand, but that it is smeared with Victor's blood.

“I just hope you will find Rose sir.”

 

* * * * *

I finds himself forgiving Jackson, in the course of the day, as the full spectrum of Mr Goodnight's scheming is revealed.

When he does find Rose, he takes her in his arms as she sobs with relief. Days later, she begins to write him letters, and it makes him wonder. _What if I had met Rose now instead of then? How different would things be?_ Of course, she might well be dead, all things considered. So perhaps it is better this way after all.

He goes to visit Bella, after Rose is rescued. He wants to tell her himself. She breaks down in tears of relief, right there in his arms. “Oh Mr Drake! You are a good man sir! A good man!”

“And you are a very brave woman Miss.” They wind up sitting in the chair again wrapped in one another's arms. Close but chaste.

 

 

* * * * *

 

And Then. 

 

 

So, Jackson has a wife. Long Susan no less. Drake can read the love there, and the pain of it. He promises himself he will not touch his friend again. Will not complicate matters further.

As things turn out, Jackson seems to feel the same way, and they settle back into a more normal sort of friendship. Throwing jibes at one another, having each others back. An equilibrium develops.  
  


Hobbs' death still distresses him at times, often unexpectedly. When the young Sergeant Flight joins their company, he seems a painfully square peg in the round hole of Hobbs memory.

He steps out with Bella. It is a wonder to him to see his affection returned. He proposes quickly, and she accepts him with immediately joy. So much about life with Bella is easy. She is gentle with him, and he with her. There is a peace about her, that seems to rub off on him. He gives up the fights, for her. Loses himself in learning her body, all the ways to please her, and please himself. He bows to her knowledge in this area.

She is a terrible cook, but he can not bring himself to say anything about it. Until one day he strikes upon the idea of colluding with Miss Goren, to both their benefits. Soon, Bella is volunteering at the orphanage, with a subtle focus on helping in the kitchen.

 

 

 

 

Life moves on.

 

* * * * *

**Author's Note:**

> Notes: I'm gutted that Drake doesn't get to hog more of the story lines. I started writing this just after watching S1E07, when I decided quite firmly that the journey of Drake's heart should be much bigger than essentially just one episode (S1E05).  
> Now I'm off to catch up with season 2.


End file.
